5fish
Captain
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2007
- Location
- Central Florida
I keep looking at technology that was on the cusp of being invented before the Civil War and if the Confederacy would have put resources into them may have been game changers for them in the war. The Automatic Revolver/ Gas Driven Revolver for the Confederate cavalry... There are patents for Automatic revolvers before for Civil war came along... from wiki...
An automatic revolver was communicated to Moses Poole, a patent agent, in 1841. The exact identity of the inventor of this weapon is unknown but in all likelihood it was a Frenchman by the name of Philippe Mathieu, who patented, amongst several different types of revolver, an almost identical design two years prior.[1] Another automatic revolver was communicated to British patent agent William Edward Newton by the Americans Mershon and Hollingsworth in 1854.[2] Both of these weapons used clockwork as the power for achieving automatic operation. The Webley-Fosbery Automatic Revolver was designed in 1895 and would go on to become the first commercial and best known automatic revolver.
Think the Confederate cavalry on the battlefield with automatic revolvers could take on Union regiments in battle with their greater rate of fire...
Terms: from wiki...
The term "automatic revolver" has two different meanings, the first being used in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when "automatic" referred not to the operational mechanism of firing, but of extraction and ejection of spent casings. An "automatic revolver" in this context is one which extracts empty fired cases "automatically," i.e., upon breaking open the action, rather than requiring manual extraction of each case individually with a sliding rod or pin (as in the Colt Single Action Army design). This term was widely used in the advertising of the period as a way to distinguish such revolvers from the far more common rod-extraction types.[49]
In the second sense, "automatic revolver" refers to the mechanism of firing rather than extraction. Double-action revolvers use a long trigger pull to cock the hammer, thus negating the need to manually cock the hammer between shots. The disadvantage of this is that the long, heavy pull cocking the hammer makes the double-action revolver much harder to shoot accurately than a single-action revolver (although cocking the hammer of a double-action reduces the length and weight of the trigger pull). A rare class of revolvers, called automatic for its firing design, attempts to overcome this restriction, giving the high speed of a double-action with the trigger effort of a single-action. The Webley-Fosbery Automatic Revolver is the most famous commercial example. It was recoil-operated, and the cylinder and barrel recoiled backwards to cock the hammer and revolve the cylinder. Cam grooves were milled on the outside of the cylinder to provide a means of advancing to the next chamber—half a turn as the cylinder moved back, and half a turn as it moved forward. .38 caliber versions held eight shots, .455 caliber versions six. At the time, the few available automatic pistols were larger, less reliable, and more expensive. The automatic revolver was popular when it first came out, but was quickly superseded by the creation of reliable, inexpensive semi-automatic pistols.[50]
The Automatic revolvers did not come along until near the end of the 19th century... Like...
Landstad 1900 Automatic Revolver
https://www.forgottenweapons.com/landstad-1900-automatic-revolver/
Fosbery Semi-Auto Revolver
https://www.personaldefenseworld.com/2018/01/semi-auto-revolver/
https://guns.fandom.com/wiki/Automatic_revolver
The Confederacy had just had some foresight think of all the weapons they could have brought to the battlefield...
An automatic revolver was communicated to Moses Poole, a patent agent, in 1841. The exact identity of the inventor of this weapon is unknown but in all likelihood it was a Frenchman by the name of Philippe Mathieu, who patented, amongst several different types of revolver, an almost identical design two years prior.[1] Another automatic revolver was communicated to British patent agent William Edward Newton by the Americans Mershon and Hollingsworth in 1854.[2] Both of these weapons used clockwork as the power for achieving automatic operation. The Webley-Fosbery Automatic Revolver was designed in 1895 and would go on to become the first commercial and best known automatic revolver.
Think the Confederate cavalry on the battlefield with automatic revolvers could take on Union regiments in battle with their greater rate of fire...
Terms: from wiki...
The term "automatic revolver" has two different meanings, the first being used in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when "automatic" referred not to the operational mechanism of firing, but of extraction and ejection of spent casings. An "automatic revolver" in this context is one which extracts empty fired cases "automatically," i.e., upon breaking open the action, rather than requiring manual extraction of each case individually with a sliding rod or pin (as in the Colt Single Action Army design). This term was widely used in the advertising of the period as a way to distinguish such revolvers from the far more common rod-extraction types.[49]
In the second sense, "automatic revolver" refers to the mechanism of firing rather than extraction. Double-action revolvers use a long trigger pull to cock the hammer, thus negating the need to manually cock the hammer between shots. The disadvantage of this is that the long, heavy pull cocking the hammer makes the double-action revolver much harder to shoot accurately than a single-action revolver (although cocking the hammer of a double-action reduces the length and weight of the trigger pull). A rare class of revolvers, called automatic for its firing design, attempts to overcome this restriction, giving the high speed of a double-action with the trigger effort of a single-action. The Webley-Fosbery Automatic Revolver is the most famous commercial example. It was recoil-operated, and the cylinder and barrel recoiled backwards to cock the hammer and revolve the cylinder. Cam grooves were milled on the outside of the cylinder to provide a means of advancing to the next chamber—half a turn as the cylinder moved back, and half a turn as it moved forward. .38 caliber versions held eight shots, .455 caliber versions six. At the time, the few available automatic pistols were larger, less reliable, and more expensive. The automatic revolver was popular when it first came out, but was quickly superseded by the creation of reliable, inexpensive semi-automatic pistols.[50]
The Automatic revolvers did not come along until near the end of the 19th century... Like...
Landstad 1900 Automatic Revolver
https://www.forgottenweapons.com/landstad-1900-automatic-revolver/
Fosbery Semi-Auto Revolver
https://www.personaldefenseworld.com/2018/01/semi-auto-revolver/
https://guns.fandom.com/wiki/Automatic_revolver
The Confederacy had just had some foresight think of all the weapons they could have brought to the battlefield...
Bringing the